The present invention relates to electrical connectors of the type comprising an insulating body formed with passages for receiving contacts each provided with a connection wire, and for receiving a rear grommet or feedthrough made of elastomer material formed with at least one row of passages for individual wires (and generally with at least two parallel rows) and held by a plate that is removably fastenable to the body.
Such connectors are in widespread use at present. Numerous applications, e.g. in the automobile industry, require connectors to be sealed, which means that it must not be possible for a polluting liquid to penetrate between the grommet and either the wires or the insulating body.
A solution that is in widespread use at present for ensuring sealing consists in casting a polymerizable material over the wires behind the grommet or as a replacement for the grommet. That solution suffers from the drawback of making the connector unsuitable for disassembly. A solution that allows a contact provided with its insulated wire to be removed and replaced consists in providing a circular sealing lip or lips in the wall of each individual passage for the purpose of bearing against a wire. However, in present grommets, sealing is obtained only if the passages are indeed occupied by wires of sufficient diameter. Unfortunately, particularly in the automobile industry, it is desired that the same connectors should be usable over a range of vehicles, with some contact locations not necessarily being occupied in every case.